Wow, it has been a long time since I last posted. I almost forgot I started this blog. I started it at a very desperate time when things were going to crap with my family.

First of all, my husband is still sober. It has been over a year. 2009 was the best year of my marriage to date. My prayers to God were answered. I prayed for 13 years. At first my prayers were for him to “stop drinking” and later after meeting a woman (who ironically also prayed for 13 years for her husband) who told me to pray that his “desire to drink” would be removed and not to just stop drinking. So I did that for many years. When I started this blog it was for me to vent….because I HATED my husband. Just him walking into a room made me want to kill him. He made us all miserable.

So, at the time I made the last post he had just quit. He finally realized that he was screwed up and that we all hated his guts. His run ins with the law helped him realize he could lose everything he cared about. He would always say to me, “You knew I drank when you married me.” or “My drinking doesn’t affect anyone, you’re crazy.” Hence the blog name.

So, it is 14 months sober and you know what he said about 4 months in?? I asked him if it was hard for him not to drink and he said, “Nope, it’s weird, I don’t even have the desire to drink anymore.” WOW!! I am a woman of faith and that just almost knocked me over. I was angry at God for so many years and I had heard before that everything happens in God’s timing and not our own. I truly believe we had to go through all the crap to get to where we are.

So, where are we? I can count on one hand how many “disagreements” or arguments we have had the last 14 months. Our finances are better because he isn’t buying beer on a daily basis like before. My 13 yo son just about 2 weeks ago told me in conversation that he actually likes his Dad now. My husband has had a complete turn around. He and I have “dates,” he goes to church with us, he takes the boys fishing, he takes pride in our home now too.

It’s not “perfect” but it is so much better than the drunken days that it might as well be perfect. I continue to pray for our family and thank God for every blessing. My husband has always been a good man, but the alcohol buried him alive for many years. I thought for several years that he might never stop drinking and that I would kill him. I can’t explain easily why I hated him so much, but alcohol truly is an evil thing in my mind and the title of my blog is appropriate….it did make me crazy and I wasn’t even the one drinking.

Just recently my husband bought a shotgun for he and one of my boys to go shoot clays. When he approached me about buying it my immediate answer was “hell no.” This irrational fear came over me and old tapes were playing in my head. We are in Texas and my son has been through gun safefty, been shooting with friends and with Boy Scouts. The gun has a trigger lock and is stored in a separate place than the ammo. Also, only me and my husband know the locations. I am all for the right to bear arms too so I wasn’t against it for any of those reasons.

He pressed me for why I was against it and I told him that I didn’t think he would ever drink again, but if he did it wouldn’t be safe to have a gun. He was kind of offended and said he never even thinks about drinking and then he qualified it by saying that even if he was drunker than drunk he would never shoot me. At that point I started laughing and he was pretty surprised by my reaction and just stared at me like I was crazy. I then told him I wasn’t worried about him shooting me, but that I would shoot HIM. I know it sounds sick and CRAZY, but so many times the anger and hatred at him and his damn Coors Light beer cans laying around did make me insane and if there had been a gun I might have used it. Now you know why my blog is titled “A Crazy Wife.”

I pray for those of you out there whose husbands still drink and I don’t really have any advice except to pray. Also, in hindsight, I should have made more efforts to attend Al-anon so that I could take the focus off my husband and on to me. Perhaps then I wouldn’t have always felt so angry and homicidal. I pray that your husbands lose their desire to drink and that your families can begin healing.

Well, dear husband has stopped drinking again. At the risk of sounding like a gullible moron, I really think this time will stick. He bought an AA Big Book, a daily reader and a Celebrate Recovery bible. He hasn’t gone to a meetin yet because he is anti social to begin with, but he is going this Friday.

Again, it has been extremely pleasant around here without him intoxicated. The man under all the alcohol is sweet, generous, loving and rational. I love that man. I don’t want to live in fear of him drinking again so like the book says, I am taking it One Day at a Time. If not for my evening work schedule I would attend Al-Anon. I have my daily reader and people I can call though.

My husband apologized to my son. Let me back up. At my last posting my DH was denying what went down, or at least OUR version of it. He spent the night in jail for public intoxication. The n ext day for the first time in ALL our years together (14) the man cried. He didn’t even cry at the birth of our children- he came close- and he came closer when Dale Earnhardt died- LOL. Anyway, he full on crid and it moved me because he has never done that. I truly think he hit his bottom this time. When he heard what names he had called our 12 year old son he just broke down. He says he is tired of being sick and tired of the stress etc and that he just wants us to be “normal.” Thank God for that. I could use a large dose of normal right now. Sign me up for NORMAL!

So, he hasn’t drank for 8 days I think, maybe 7. His face is no longer beet red. He’s looking kind of yellow, which will probably go away after his liver recovers a little. Last time the yellow went away and he looked so good complexion wise. Healthy. He’s not hacking every morning in the bathroom either.

Oh! And another prayer was answered. He got a new job today and starts later this week. He is finally leaving the drug and alcohol infested employer for a more peaceful, sane operation! We have been wanting a new job for him for a while. He desperately wants out because everyone down there drinks and worse. The last week he has been making excuses and ducking out because he doesn’t have the courage to just tell them he isn’t drinking anymore. Pride. I don’t know why he can’t just say it, but he can’t.

I have started this blog as therapy for myself. If anyone gleans from it or can relate to my life, then that is a bonus. I welcome your comments if you can relate. I welcome your encouragement if you have a “success story,” although I can’t relate to you yet.

I am 37 years old and I have 3 children, all boys, being raised by me and their alcoholic father. We are trying to be a christian family and I am trying my best to raise them right. I homeschool them and we have a huge network of friends and support for that. We live in a small town away from any big city civilization and I don’t have any friends that I can honestly share the truth of my life with for fear of being cast out. I don’t think anyone would purposefully be mean, but you know how it is, they would distance themselves from me if they knew the trauma of our life behind the pretty picture I feel I have to paint to fit in. I know the truth of the matter is that everyone I know has drama/trauma, but just like religion and politics, you just don’t discuss it. I do have one girlfriend that I let in a little bit, but even she doesn’t know the whole truth. My mother knows the truth, but that isn’t the same.

I hope for this blog to be a refuge and a place I can safely, anonymously vent about my marriage to an alcoholic who won’t/can’t stop drinking. I believe he wants to stop, but until he can swallow his pride and seek help from AA I don’t believe it is possible. He has quit for short spurts, but I have long ago given up the fantasy that he will stop for longer than 4 or 5 weeks. That is as long as he can go on his own will power. I know lots of people in the cyber world have great disdain for AA, mainly because it seems to be a “christian” program, but I find that kind of interesting. As someone who grew up in an alcoholic home- drunk 12 years and sober with “the program” the rest of the time until he passed away- I can say that I didn’t find it especially christian. In fact, millions of christians prefer christian recovery programs like “Celebrate Recovery” because in AA/Al-anon you really aren’t supposed to discuss Christ or the Bible. So many people think the mere mention of the word “God” automatically means christian. So wrong, so wrong. Anyway, that is another soapbox. My point is that I have seen AA work for my father and my mother (Al-anon for her) and for those that truly desire recovery and are willing to surrender to a power greater than themselves it will work. I know without a doubt that my husband needs AA. That is the only thing that will help him stay sober after he quits of his own free will. AA and the power of God helped my father transform to a sober person, a rational person, a fun to be around person and I know that underneath the beer and the anger that my husband is all those things.

We are a “christian” family, meaning me and the kids and dear alcoholic husband plays along. He HAS come a long way from not believing in God at all to actually attending church with us sporadically. He even asked for a Bible several years ago and I catch him reading it from time to time. So, while AA isn’t a christian program, it is spiritual. Combining that with my first hand experience of it working for my childhood family, I guess that is why I desire my husband to get help from AA. I realize other people out there don’t do the God thing and that is their choice, so please no comments about ours unless it is to support that choice.

I say I am a “crazy wife” because usually in an alcoholic family the non alcoholic spouse is the one that everyone thinks is crazy and I feel crazy a lot. I grew up in an alcholic home and while there was fear of my alcoholic father, it is my mother that acted pyscho. That is how it is often in our home. I get angry with the drunk and I fly off the handle so it must be me with the problem right?

Wrong. Well, not entirely. I do have a problem. I am married to it. I knew he was a drinker when I married him, but I was blinded by “love” and how sweet he was to me and my 3 year old son (who is now almost 18). As the years have gone by I see that I was a fool to have married someone I was not equally yoked with. I believe he loves us in the ways he knows how, but he has an addiction that he loves more. I realize he has an addiction and he isn’t choosing alcohol on purpose (most of the time), but it is still very difficult to live with even knowing he has a sickness. Most of the time I hate him. I actually only hate the drunk him, the sober him I love and could spend hours with peacefully. I battle with concept of “illness or sickness” versus “weakness or ‘just a jerk'” It is so hard to have compassion for him when he acts so ugly and hateful while drunk. Before he starts drinking he is pretty funny and fun, but as the days hours wear on it becomes extremely unpleasant and we all have to walk on eggshells for fear of setting him off.

To top off the alcholism my husband apparently has some sort of sleep disorder (or maybe not) because when he drinks he “sleep walks and talks” and does/says crazy things that he can’t remember. If you engage him and he wakes up he feels justified in his verbal and physical attacks/threats against you. Last night my 12 year old son pulled a kitchen knife on him because he “woke up” talking crazy and yelling at my son. He was home alone with his father and got cornered by him in the kitchen so he felt he had no other defense. One would think that a grown man, a father, could take this as a wake up call no? No. He is irate about the knife episode and I agree my son could have just left the house instead of pulling the knife, but in his child mind he had no other option at the moment. He did put the knife down when my drunk sleeping crazed husband told him to “go ahead, stick me.” My son fled up the stairs and jumped out of the second story window onto the lawn and ran to his grandmothers’ (my mother) who lives on the street behind us. Isn’t that great? What a family!! I am so angry and raw about this and I feel terrible for my kid and I want to pummel my husband. I believe my son’s story 100% (because I have BTDT with my husband) and my husband (the lying alcoholic he is) is angry at me because I don’t believe HIM. I have NO reason to believe this man! I live with him, I know him, I know the drunk look, smell, sound and behavior. I am not stupid. I know my drunk husband and he is in denial about all his behavior except when he REALLY screws up. Like 4 months ago when he got pulled over for drunk driving. That is the last thing that “scared him sober” for 4 weeks. I mean, I believe he was determined and scared, but that only motivates for so long. As the memory fades, the denial and justification becomes so much easier.

So this morning I had to take the same son to meet his scout troop for a 4 day campout. Nice huh? He gets to leave on that note with his father. My baby is a worry wart too. I prayed for him and I told him to not worry and go and just have fun. He is worried about me and his brothers being treated bad and even told me where he has his stash of pocket knives etc. I told him I wouldn’t need them and reassured him that I could handle his father. A 12 year old boy shouldn’t have to worry about these things. A 12 year old boy shouldn’t feel he has to pull a knife on his father. His father shouldn’t be swearing at him, calling him vile names and threatening him. Conveniently, my husband never remembers these episodes and accuses us of lying most of the time. The only time we have any peace in this house is when my husband goes to work. I love when he comes home so late that all he can do is drop into bed. Before anyone thinks he actually works late, let me just say he has co-losers at work that he hangs with and they all drink together after work. Then he DRIVES home.